Megaworld profit more than doubles

MANILA, Philippines - Megaworld Corp., the flagship property unit of tycoon Andrew L. Tan, said profits last year more than doubled to reach a new high, behind robust real estate sales and rental income.

Megaworld said net income surged 139 percent to P21.6 billion last year from P9.03 billion the previous year.

The firm said the reported profit is inclusive of a P12.1-billion non-recurring gain recorded last year.

Without the non-recurring gain, Megaworld said net income still managed to rise 14 percent year-on-year to P9.4 billion.

“Last year was a milestone for us. With Megaworld celebrating its 25th anniversary, we raked in record earnings and managed to grow our land bank to over 4,000 hectares. Our income growth last year was driven by both real estate sales and rental income,” said Tan, chairman and chief executive officer of Megaworld.

Megaworld’s consolidated revenues, excluding non-recurring gain, increased 15 percent year-on-year to P41 billion with real estate sales picking up 16 percent to P24.6 billion and rental income growing 17 percent to P7 billion.

“We have a more diversified real estate sales mix that is propelled by our integrated urban township developments in Metro Manila, Cebu and Iloilo as well as tourism-related projects in Tagaytay and Boracay,” Tan said.

With Megaworld’s rental income growing in line with the company’s expectations, Tan said a continued growth seen in its office and mall leasable space would help push rental income to exceed the P10-billion mark by 2016.

“We expect to maintain similar growth momentum generated in the past, achieving a double-digit net income growth every year on the back of a stronger and bigger township portfolio,” Tan said.

Megaworld launched five townships last year while it seeks to inaugurate five more this year to increase the company’s township developments to 20 by the end of 2015.

Megaworld has completed 342 buildings with a total area of 6.4 million square meters across its various townships in the country over the past 25 years.